Who is the Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition?

Our mission is to reverse the trend of mass incarceration in Colorado. We are a coalition of nearly 7,000 individual members and over 100 faith and community organizations who have united to stop perpetual prison expansion in Colorado through policy and sentence reform.

Our chief areas of interest include drug policy reform, women in prison, racial injustice, the impact of incarceration on children and families, the problems associated with re-entry and stopping the practice of using private prisons in our state.

Monday, June 25, 2012

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday limited the use of life
terms in prison for murderers under 18, ruling that judges must consider
the defendant’s youth and the nature of the crime before putting him
behind bars with no hope for parole.
In a 5-4 decision, the high
court struck down as cruel and unusual punishment the laws in about 28
states that mandated a life term for murderers, including those under
age 18.
The justices ruled in the cases of two 14-year-olds who
were given life terms for their role in a homicide, but their decision
goes further. It applies to all those under 18. It does not
automatically free any prisoner, and it does not forbid life terms for young murderers.
Nonetheless, it is an important victory for those who have objected to imposing very long prison terms on very young offenders.
Justice Elena Kagan
referred to state laws that “mandated each juvenile (convicted of
murder) die in prison even if the judge or jury would have thought that
his youth and…the nature of his crime made a lesser sentence (for
example, life with the possibility of parole) more appropriate.”
“We therefore hold that mandatory life without parole for those under age of 18 at the time of their crime violates the 8th Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments,” she said. Justices Anthony M. Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor agreed.
The
court’s opinion does not say whether its ruling applies only to future
sentences, or whether it could give a new hearing to the more than 2,000
prisoners who are serving life terms for earlier murders.
Chief
Justice John G. Roberts Jr. dissented. “Put simply, if a 17-year old is
convicted of deliberately murdering an innocent victim, it is not
unusual for the murderer to receive a mandatory sentence of life without
parole.” Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr. joined in dissent.
The
majority, however, argues that states had not necessarily intended to
impose life terms on juvenile offenders. Instead, they passed laws that
allowed juveniles to be sentenced as adults for serious crimes. And they
also passed laws that set life in prison without parole as the required
punishment for murder.
In one case that came before the court,
Kuntrell Jackson was 14 when he and two other teenagers went to a video
store in Arkansas planning to rob it. He stayed outside, and one of the
youths pulled a gun and killed the store clerk. Jackson was charged as
an adult and given a life term with no parole.
In the second case,
Evan Miller, a 14-year-old from Alabama, was convicted of murder after
he and another boy set fire to a trailer where they had bought drugs
from a neighbor. He too was give a life term with no parole.
Today’s
decision in Miller vs. Alabama is the third in a decade that puts new
constitutional limits on crimes involving juveniles.
In 2005, the
court abolished the death sentence for those under 18 who are convicted
of murder. In 2010, the justices went further and said life terms with
no parole are unconstitutional for juveniles who commit crimes short of
murder.
Today’s decision does not end life terms for young
murderers, but it says judges or juries must consider the defendant’s
youth before imposing a life term with no parole.
Bryan Stevenson, the Alabama attorney
who argued the case, called the ruling “an important win for children.
The court took a significant step forward by recognizing the fundamental
unfairness of mandatory death-in-prison sentences that do not allow
sentencers to consider the unique status of children.”